Life

Decreasing the size does not matter anymore when you already have a tiny device like the 'old' Shuffle. The result you get from an even smaller (ca. 50%) form factor is bad usability. No dedicated buttons anymore, just a stupid one-button headphone remote (my Panasonic Walkman had that already in 1996). They could have just added the playlist feature to the old Shuffle and done. Voice over, really? Different voices for PC and MAC? WTF!?! And that guided-tour video girl is annoying! Oh boy, did Steve approve all that? Please come back Steve! I am worried about my shares .

The new Shuffle is the best argument for buying a generic and inexpensive USB MP3 stick with twice the memory for at least half the price. Guess what? You'll get a free display with it. Never was a big fan of the Shuffle. But the 'old' one had a nice look and a tolerable interface.

As a product and usability freak, I had to get this of my chest!

Now I feel better. 

Palin's ABC TV interview

OMG! Her interview was pathetic and ridiculous. She is such a bad speaker, you can see and hear her think. She would not withstand 3 min in Trump's board room. That'd be actually quite a good yardstick . Bring on the show! I can't see how Hilary supporters will swing vote for her. She is a hypocritical clone, just an empty bin with a boring worn-out tape record playing. Sorry guys, I am always for fact-based discussions, but with Palin, I can't do it. She isn't discussing fact-based either. I have tons of respect for McCain, but Palin... don't get me started. She's not even the same league. Go home!

AWESOME!!! I keep watching the German goals of the last two matches and still get goose bumps every single time. And even more when I listen to "Seven Nation Army". The match was a real thriller from the start and even more when the TV signal broke down for ~6 minutes.

All goals semi-final


All German goals quarter-final


Funny story, Germany's most renowned TV news got our flag wrong

Happy Easter folks! Just yesterday I complained that there are literally zero Easter songs but tons of Christmas songs. Thanks to the weather craziness we can just rephrase all the Christmas songs now: e.g. I'm dreaming of a white Easter. I just love Easter in ALL its colors .

A look outside


What a ride!

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Time to look back. It's been the first year since a while that I stayed home during the summer instead of going abroad. So I spent time with my friends and met Philip during his short visit, good times. Speaking of traveling, two great 2007 memories are, attending Martin's tech talk, and being at the Diggnation live taping in London. Two short trips with long term memory potential.

But actually I wanted to do a little unconvential review. Did you ever try to sum up a year by just referring to songs? Well, the songs that describe my 2007 best (in terms of mood, importance and times listened to) are:

• Flight Of The Conchords - You're so beautiful (FotC rules) UPDATED
• Gavin DeGraw - I don't want to be
• Tenacious D - Tribute (I became a big Tenacious D fan this year)
• Natasha Bedingfield - Soulmate

How does your 2007 soundtrack sound like? Comments...

I am looking forward to meeting lots of my 'Holm buddys at the Euro Cup in the Alps. Also, 2008 we'll launch youwote (this time for sure). And it is finally going to happen, I am coming close to the end of my study . Did I put that vague enough ? Sad news, my sister and her boyfriend will be moving away from Cologne .

Embrace 2008! May it bring joyful surprises into your life as 2007 has done it to mine.

Update: Latest news has it that it wasn't a medical chopper, but some law enforcment guys. There were two men rushing out of the chopper right after the landing. But they never came back. What a Halloween story. Orange pumpkins, orange choppers. Coincidence?

Cologne: Being a student isn't as easy anymore as it used to be. Traditionally teachers try to give no lessons on a Friday so that business students can stay home and have a nice long sleep. But not today. In a world where people are ambushed everywhere with guerilla marketing (subway hold-on straps in shape of lingerie) the good Friday sleep-in-the-day is ruined. Today even our military rescue chopper team does guerilla actions. Today at 9am a frakking rescue chopper set down on the playground in front of our home. White bling bling SUVs with spinners are nice, but landing your chopper is P I M P! Well the color job is way uncool, but hey it's a frakking chooper.

I really have no idea why this guy put his chopper down here. There is a big hospital just a sec away. As soon as he touched ground people came rushing in and behind every window you saw flashes as people in Pyjamas (like me) were making pics and vids of that weird event, hilarious!

The chopper just left while I am writing this. Ah nice... the whole place smells like gasoline. It totally remembers me of Apocalypse Now 'I love the smell of napalm in the morning.' Totally rad!

What do you think was behind all this? Write down your comments.

I've went to London on Oct 3rd to attend the Diggnation Live Filming. Check the pictures in the gallery or my facebook site. I arrived at Stansted and took the Express train to Liverpool Street. It took less than 24h and I was already home. I just came to London for the show. That's what you call a fan I guess. Everybody please check out Diggnation and TotallyRadShow (they were there, too). These are my two favorite weekly podcasts.

We got kicked out of the pub at 1h. I must say I belonged to the guys who joined the Pre-Drinks first and left the After-Drinks last. Afterwards I took the bus to Stansted around 2:40h. I arrived at the airport around 4h I guess. Stansted is the worst airport, you can't sleep there. The benches have fraking armrests for every seat, almost impossible to lie down. I took my plane back home at 8h. It was a kinda messed up night sleep-wise. But totally worth it!

Here are some video impressions.

Hi guys! Last weekend I've been in Barcelona meeting Stockholm friends. Read all about it in our Stockholm blog (incl. pics).

Hola!
Last Saturday I had the pleasure to join Martin's tech talk at his farm on Menorca. He invited entrepreneurs and geeks to join this very interesting and casual event. Besides learning a lot and getting to know awesome web entrepreneurs I also talked with people about youwote.com. We are working on the prototype right now. We that are Thomas Voigt, Philip Berg and me. As this was my first time attending such kind of event with so many important and interesting people I first had to learn on the fly to drop my natural shyness and just approach people . Luckily I just finished printing and cutting my business cards before I left Cologne. Having business cards ready to exchange is mandatory as I learned.
Check out Loic Le Meur's blog as he has a lot of footage like this video (I am in it as well, at the very end). Martin also posted some links with summaries and photos.



I can't tell you how special this event was and how happy and thankful I am that I could join it. Muchas gracias Martin!

One last thing. Attending the event was like a last minute decision. So I had to find flight connections quickly but affordable for my student budget. I checked all low-fare airlines and had like 7-9 different possible routes including ferries times 3-5 different airlines. This totally felt like "The Amazing Race". All my fellow racers (friends who love the show) know what I mean: "I need the fastest flight to ...". I was lucky finding a set of flights which finally brought me on time to Menorca, although I almost didn't sleep the whole weekend. But it was worth it.
One problem I was facing was which part of the whole journey do I book first? Hotel? 1st Flight? Connecting flight? Return Flight? All at once? I just prepared all booking processes as much as I could so that I could almost book them the same moment. You might say that I wasted too much thought about that procedure, but I am German and we love procedures .

Mega LOL! I live in a small street with almost zero traffic. The street gets even smaller when cars park on both sides on the sidewalk. But just now there was a major knot of cars stuck in front of my house. My mom wanted to leave the house with her car but couldn't as she was locked-in. I guess there must be a big event in the church around the corner. There were two cars terribly parked on both sides of the street leaving space for a bike to pass but not more. So the other cars coming along the street from both sides did not get thru and my mom could not leave our garage. But off course people still tried if their ridiculous big cars fit thru that tiny gap. I love those situations because you can see people think in slow-mo and under stress. Result: Nobody moved, total brain dead, almost zombie like. So I stepped up to the plate and took the role of the conductor. I told the cars to back off and asked the two ladies to park their cars better (sorry girls, not my fault that it were women who caused the troubles). I took less than 1-2 minutes and the traffic knot was gone. Now, APPLAUSE!
This actually felt like a part of an assessment center.

Link: sevenload.com

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Ok guys, this is insane! Even if you are normally not interested in cars, that video is frakking insane. I love Top Gear, they are the best.